The Importance of Playground Safety
Thursday, October 20th, 2011Taking your child to the playground can be a great way to get some exercise, bond with your child, and allow him or her to interact with other children. However, in some unfortunate instances, a fun afternoon at the playground can come to an abrupt end if your child suffers a playground injury.
Dangerous conditions on playgrounds, including equipment malfunctions, poor surface designs, and reckless behavior, cause thousands of child injuries every year in the United States. In fact, one study found that on average, over 200,000 children are treated in emergency rooms for injuries they suffered while on a playground.
In order to keep your children safe, it is important that you familiarize yourself with playground safety tips so that you can be aware of your child’s safety in nearly any playground situation.
Adult Supervision
One of the easiest ways to prevent playground injuries is to make sure that all children on a playground are supervised at all times by a responsible adult. In fact, many playground injuries that do happen could have easily been prevented with adequate supervision and intervention.
Before taking your child to a new playground, you should inspect the facilities and make sure that there is a place for parents to supervise the children on the playground equipment, and that every part of the playground is visible from that location.
Additionally, it is a good idea to examine the behaviors of children on the playground. Many families will frequent the same playground, and so if you visit a playground where all the children seem to be overly aggressive, you may want to consider looking for a different place to visit.
Playground Surface Design